NPI's Cascadia Advocate

Offering commentary and analysis from Washington, Oregon, and Idaho, The Cascadia Advocate provides the Northwest Progressive Institute's uplifting perspective on world, national, and local politics.

Friday, March 18th, 2011

Tim Eyman tries to rile up his supporters with Permanent Defense analysis

On Wednes­day, we pub­lished a report over at Per­ma­nent Defense ana­lyz­ing Tim Eyman’s first two months of fundrais­ing, enti­tled, “Vot­ers Want More Choic­es begins 2011 with no wealthy bene­fac­tor in sight”.

That report appar­ent­ly hit a nerve, because Tim Eyman is present­ly send­ing out a mass-email to his sup­port­ers quot­ing it in full and ask­ing them to respond by giv­ing him more mon­ey… and send­ing me a nasty­gram. Here’s the last part of that mes­sage (which has also been cross-post­ed at unSoundPolitics):

Please send an email to Andrew Vil­leneuve and let him know that his arro­gant gloat­ing inspired you to donate.

You can also email Bri­an Tom­lin­son, can­di­date for Olympia City Coun­cil, who said “God damn Tim Eyman” at a town hall meet­ing on Sat­ur­day: [Bri­an Tom­lin­son’s email address] — tell him that his ugli­ness inspired you to contribute.

It will dri­ve them crazy to learn that their attacks only inspired more peo­ple to help out. They want­ed to hurt our cause, imag­ine how infu­ri­at­ing it’ll be for them to learn they helped our cause. Make sure to ‘cc’ me at [Tim Eyman’s email address] when you send your emails to them — I’ll share the best ones with every­one next week.

Nowhere in his email does Eyman deny what we said about him in that report: that with­out big bucks from a wealthy bene­fac­tor, his ini­tia­tive fac­to­ry will grind to a halt. And that’s because Eyman knows what we know: mon­ey is what has been greas­ing the gears of his oper­a­tion for more than a decade.

The mon­ey Eyman has raised from small-dol­lar donors is neg­li­gi­ble com­pared to what he has received from the likes of wealthy invest­ment banker Michael Dun­mire, Belle­vue devel­op­er Kem­per Free­man Jr., the gam­bling indus­try, BP, Cono­coPhillips, Shell, Bank of Amer­i­ca, Wells Far­go, and USBank.

With­out them, Eyman could not buy his way onto the ballot.

NPI and Per­ma­nent Defense do not have such pow­er­ful allies. We rely prin­ci­pal­ly on finan­cial con­tri­bu­tions from fel­low activists to pay our bills.

For almost ten years,  we’ve fought Tim Eyman and opposed his destruc­tive ini­tia­tives with­out a wealthy benefactor.

Your sup­port has helped make that pos­si­ble. You’ve helped us along the way with your time, tal­ent, and trea­sure. We can’t thank you enough.

But as Tim Eyman’s email above makes clear, our task is not fin­ished. Tim Eyman is not retir­ing. He’s on the hunt for a new wealthy bene­fac­tor. And if his­to­ry is any indi­ca­tion, he’ll find one. He’s known for being relentless.

For­tu­nate­ly, so are we. We haven’t giv­en up and we haven’t burned out because we know you’re count­ing on us. We know that many of you appre­ci­ate get­ting the chance to learn more about we’ve been up to in per­son, and enjoy­ing refresh­ments with oth­er NPI sup­port­ers. That’s why, this April 28th, we’re hold­ing our third Spring Fundrais­ing Gala on Mer­cer Island.

Our speak­ers include Peter Stein­brueck and Reuven Car­lyle, with more to be announced.

If Tim Eyman’s attempt­ed harass­ment has inspired you to con­tribute to help NPI keep going, we urge you to buy a tick­et to our Spring Fundrais­ing Gala now.

Buy an indi­vid­ual tick­et ($40):

Buy a house­hold tick­et ($70):

If you need details about the event for your cal­en­dar, here they are:

  • What: An event to ben­e­fit the North­west Pro­gres­sive Institute
  • Who: Peter Stein­brueck, Reuven Car­lyle, NPI’s Andrew Vil­leneuve (with more speak­ers to be announced!)
  • Where: Com­mu­ni­ty Cen­ter at Mer­cer View, 8236 SE 24th Street, Mer­cer Island, WA 98040–2235
  • When: Thurs­day, April 28th, 2011. Recep­tion begins at 6:30 PM, main pro­gram to begin at 7:15 PM.
  • What: Refresh­ments, music, mem­o­rable speak­ers, and great company

Can’t attend the gala? You can still make a dona­tion of any amount secure­ly from our web­site. Or, if you pre­fer, you can donate by check. Our address is:

North­west Pro­gres­sive Institute
Post Office Box 264
Red­mond, WA 98073–0264

One more thing: Stu­dents who want to vol­un­teer to help put on the event can get in the door free. If you’re inter­est­ed in vol­un­teer­ing, please get in touch with us.

With your help, NPI’s Per­ma­nent Defense will con­tin­ue watch­dog­ging Tim Eyman and respond­ing to his mis­in­for­ma­tion for years to come.

We hope to see you on April 28th!

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